Is AMD cheating with the Ryzen 3000 Boost?
Overclocker and Youtuber der8auer has created a survey on the Ryzen 3000 Boost's frequency. He came to the conclusion that the majority of the processors don't reach the specified boost speeds.
According to the survey, only 5.6 percent of Ryzen 9 3900X processors achieve a boost of 4.6 GHz.
What was measured?
der8auer asked his viewers to run the Cinebench R15 Single Thread Benchmark and to analyse the frequency of the CPU in question twice a second using the HwInfo tool. According to Roman Hartung, aka. der8auer, this is also how AMD arrives at their results.
Most users didn't reach the specified maximum clock rate. A total of 2,700 users sent in their results.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y5DXbhD3h3A (in German)
The outcome: a closer look
The Ryzen 5 3600 performs the best. Out of 542 valid results, a boost around 50 percent was achieved. Only every second Ryzen 5 3600 achieves the indicated boost value of 4.2 GHz.
The Ryzen 5 3600X looks even less promising. Here only 9.4 percent of all tested CPUs achieved the specified boost of 4.4 GHz. With 180 valid results, the sample size is relatively small.
der8auer included 1,036 valid Ryzen 7 3700X results. Just 153, i.e. almost 15 percent of them, achieve the indicated boost of 4.4 GHz.
The results of the Ryzen 3600X and 3700X are almost positive compared to the Ryzen 9 3900X. Here only 5.6 percent of all tested CPUs achieved the specified boost of 4.6 GHz. Out of 685 valid results, that's only 38.
How reliable are these results?
Right at the start, der8auer admits that his sample isn't beyond all doubt. For example, he points out that users who have poor results are more likely to share them because they are dissatisfied.
Hartung also indicates that different hardware was used in his survey. The results are therefore only comparable to a limited extent. Still, he compared his samples' BIOS and AGESA versions for consistency.
Despite these restrictions, the survey shows that many users don't get what they paid for. der8auer recommends the new Ryzen despite the results. He hopes that AMD can solve the problem and rethink the way they state the boost.
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